70-year-old man loses over $70,000 after fake Google Play was installed on his mobile phone

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A 70-year-old man loses more than $70,000 within 2 hours after a fake Google Play application was installed on his mobile phone. As a result, his personal data was stolen by hackers who then transferred away money, which includes his pension from his bank account.

According to Zaobao, Mr Lu told the newspaper in an interview that at around 9am on 29 January, he received a call from someone from DBS Bank. The DBS staff told him that since 3am that day, there were multiple overseas transactions within just two hours.

And based on transaction history, about $71,000 was transferred out of his account, leaving only about $2,000 left in his account. Mr Lu then immediately asked the staff to freeze his bank account.

“The money includes a pension I received in January this year, which was about $30,000,” said Mr Lu.

Mr Lu said he has since reported the incident to the police and handed over his mobile phone to the police for investigation. Investigation showed that his personal data was stolen due to a fake Google Play application installed on his mobile phone.

“The police told me that if the money is transferred to a foreign account, I will not be able to get it back. It is my hard-earned money. It really hurts that my money is being transferred out of my account like this. My wife and I are losing sleep every night because of this incident,” said Mr Lu.

Mr Lu emphasised that he did not provide any one-time password (OTP) at that time, and neither did he click on any suspicious link.

He felt that there were lapses in the bank’s security measures and he should be given an explanation. He approached the bank in February, hoping that the bank will return his money.

Mr Lu also hopes that his unfortunate experience can remind others to be careful and avoid their personal information from being stolen.

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